Industry Research

Tougher Industry Roughing It Out, Stats Show

Each year LCT Magazine faces some of the same challenges of the businesspeople we write about: Keeping clients engaged and coming back.

With disruption and competition multiplied by technology, we doubled down on efforts to get you — our readers, subscribers, and supporters — to click into one more email to take our survey, or for those fed up with stuffed email boxes, the option to fill out a good old-fashioned print survey via snail mail.

This year, LCT deployed print and multiple digital survey versions that accurately fielded respondents of all fleet sizes, reflecting general industry ratios. More than 250 operators participated, providing a realistic picture of the industry relative to its overall size. The survey generated a 95% confidence level with a margin of error of +/- 5%.

Below are some highlights that should not be big news to anyone paying close attention to industry trends, for better or worse.

PositivesThe industry has been disrupted and battered on many fronts this decade, such as in the areas of technology-driven competition, regulations, labor costs, hiring difficulties, and insurance, but remains resilient.

Almost half of operators saw revenues increase during the past year.

Almost half of operators plan to add staff this year.

The same percentage believe the economy is getting better, and only 13% think it’s getting worse. The rest say it’s performing about the same.

One-third of operators increased their rates during the past year, and 64% kept rates the same, despite all the pressures from transportation network companies.

SolvablesSince we don’t like to dwell on negatives, we’ll point out a few challenges that invite solutions:

Four in 10 operators say chauffeured transportation industry conditions are getting worse, with 22% saying better and 37% saying about the same.

55% of operators say they have lost business to TNCs, up from 50% in 2016.

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